A Study on Ancient Chinese Shanxi Locks

Abstract

The use of locks has been around for thousands of years throughout history. The developments of locks are closely related to the materials, technologies, tools, and cultures of the subject’s time period, but very few literatures for ancient locks can be found. According to the existing ancient locks left, the flat-springs locks are the most important types that can be traced back to the 2th century BC. The springs are installed in the lock. The elasticity effect between the key and the springs are applied for locking and opening. The flat-springs locks were commonly used after the Eastern Han dynasty around 200 AD. It was no later than the Ming dynasty (1368-1644 AD) that locks which needed specific procedures and methods to open were widely manufactured and used. These kinds of locks are difficult to open within a short period of time even if the correct keys are in place. According to the opening methods and the types of keyholes, ancient Chinese locks can be divided into two categories such as open-keyhole and hidden-keyhole locks. There are diversified types of Chinese locks with ideas, which are full of ancient craftsmanship showing extraordinary technology and superb wisdom. This paper takes the locks of Shanxi Province as an example to give a brief description about the developments of ancient Chinese locks.